White Ladder
by HardlyFatal
Summary: Kagome learns that she and Kikyou were not the only ones to wear their soul. COMPLETE


**Author's Note:** This was written for the LJ community, iyflashfic, in answer to quirkyslayer's request for the November/December 2005 round. Hope you like it, please let me know what you think.

**White Ladder**

A creak as pottery was strained past endurance… a brittle crash, and then, nothing at all: that was how Kikyou died. Inuyasha launched himself at Mouryoumaru, her murderer, and in his recklessness was cut down; his body, absorbed, made the monster even more powerful.

One by one, they were killed; one by one, they were taken in by Mouryoumaru. All except Kagome, that is; every time he tried to touch her body, he was burned. In the end, he had to leave her there, the only one of their group to escape intact. Curiously, her corpse did not rot, nor was it disturbed even once by any who happened upon her in subsequent days.

x

Sesshoumaru learned of his brother's demise when, during battle, Mouryoumaru had sent Kaze no Kizu hurtling toward him. Then came the monk's void, and a blast of foxfire. He understood what had occurred, and then he wondered. _Where was the miko?_

He resolved to find out.

It was weeks later when Sesshoumaru and his companions found her. Kagome's body might have been dead, but her soul had not moved on; no, she had been trapped there, unable to move, for the past month. Nothing else to do, so she'd spent the time grieving.

Suspended, not alive but not dead, and in spite of that grief, secrets whispered in her deaf ears. She saw before her mind's eye a white ladder, and knew that each rung was another life upon which a soul must step to progress.

She saw Kikyou's rung, felt it the same way she'd felt the presence of the other miko before Mouryoumaru had killed her yet again—the scent of fresh water and old wine, that tragic clutch of yearning for release. Kagome also saw her own rung of the ladder. She was all stubborn faith in sweet life, and rage against thunder and war.

But there, between them: another rung. Another life, another body, another name. Another little burning flame of existence had lived after Kikyou and before Kagome, a white river of patience and love and devotion.

It felt… familiar.

x

The ground around her body was still scarred from the battle that had cost them all their lives. The entire area was a barren wasteland, with the exception of the girl lying prone in its center. Sesshoumaru stepped forward, Tenseiga's naked blade gleaming in the hard, bright light of the moon.

Kagome cried as she came back to life, and kept crying even as she was lifted from the ground and deposited on the back of the two-headed dragon. Forever, forever crying, it felt like; the toad, Jaken, told her to stop.

"Forever crying!" he exclaimed. "You tremble, you sigh, you do absolutely nothing else!"

"Tall order," she replied, hiccupping. But he thought she was mocking his height, and stomped off.

After a while, Kagome stopped crying, and took notice of the world around her again. Sesshoumaru ignored her, Jaken berated her, but Rin was her solace.

"You feel like a white river," she told the child. This was nothing new; she was always telling Rin she would be Kagome some day. "I've seen the ladder, you see," she would say.

And Rin would nod and smile. She'd seen the ladder, too, after all.

Sesshoumaru watched them all the time. Not because he feared for Rin's safety, but because the more time they spent together, the more they resembled each other. Not just in appearance, but in gesture and speech as well. When they stopped at villages, people constantly made the mistake of believing Rin was Kagome's daughter.

"And it's the other way around!" Kagome would say, and laugh. "Isn't that _funny_?"

x

They met Kouga, along the way. Sesshoumaru tried to speak to him of strategy and warfare, but the wolf he couldn't keep his eyes off Kagome. Her behaviour was such, most days, that Sesshoumaru couldn't find it in himself to hold it against him.

"I saw your white ladder, too, Kouga-kun!" she told him with a smile. "At least I know now why Hojo-kun is so persistent!"

Kouga left, soon enough, finally understanding how deeply Inuyasha had mattered to Kagome. He vowed all the same that he would come for her, to wed and protect her. Sesshoumaru sent him away; it was clear that Kagome was fit to be no one's wife, and he protected her well enough. She was good with Rin, and merely smiled vacantly when Jaken lost control of his temper. Also, she could cook. Sesshoumaru was nothing if not practical.

x

The days spun on, as days are wont to do, and one night Kagome followed Sesshoumaru to where he bathed.

"I don't want to feel tonight," she said, shedding her clothes and sliding into the water toward him. "You can keep me from feeling, I think. I think you can make the noise dark again."

"Perhaps another time," he said, meaning nothing of the sort. "But you may wash my back."

x

The day came, of course, when they had to fight Mouryoumaru. He fought them with Kongo Souha, with the Kazaana, even sent arcs of foxfire to blind them. Sesshoumaru fought with single-minded purpose, and Jaken and Ah-Un guarded Rin. Kagome was no help at all; she stood chittering on the sidelines, speaking to her deceased friends about what she'd been up to since their deaths.

Finally, desperately tired of dealing with this particular menace, Sesshoumaru snatched Kagome up and shook her.

"You must fight," he told her. "Do you understand? You must fight."

She placed her little hands along his face, her smile sweet, and touched her nose to his. "You're rhyme and reason," she informed him. "You're thunder and war."

She detached herself from his grasp, very gently. "But your ladder has only one rung. So I will fight."

And fight she did, a burning flame of power and vengeance. Mouryoumaru's shell was cracked open and the tender insides of him were exposed, awaiting only the final, killing blow. Kagome pushed by Sesshoumaru and walked through Mouryoumaru, picking through him until she found what she sought.

"There you are," she said warmly, as if Inuyasha had merely wandered off for a few moments. Nearly half of his body was left, fused to the tiny wolf-child they'd failed to rescue all those months ago, a goodly portion of Hiraikotsu, and what appeared to be one of Kirara's tails.

She knelt by his side, taking his hand and resting her head on his shoulder, seemingly unaware of the crimson smeared on her cheek and starting to mat her hair.

"He waited for me!" she told Sesshoumaru, smiling brightly up at him. "Now we can all go, together."

x

Rin scampered away from Jaken and skirted Sesshoumaru's legs, intent on seeing Kagome. If she felt dismay at the sight of the other girl in the wreckage of a monster's corpse, seated beside a mostly-dead and assuredly-senseless hanyou, she showed no sign of it.

"The white river will wash it all away," she told Kagome with a smile, and Kagome smiled back.

"Wash it all away, all away," Kagome sang softly, and rested her head on Inuyasha's shoulder once more. Another body, another name, another rung…"

Sesshoumaru took Rin away. He didn't even wait to put her on Ah-Un, simply carried her in the crook of his arm as he flew west. Even with such haste, he could feel the surge of Kagome's power, and smell the charring of flesh and hair and bone. He hazarded a glance back, with his far-seeing eyes, and saw the white flames engulfing everything in the vicinity. The intensity of her power scorched him, pinkening his skin, prickling it with the sheer force.

Rin stiffened, just for a moment, and there was a tiny, pale flicker in her eyes, like a flame, or perhaps a river current… and then it was gone, and she was smiling again. She cupped his face, and touched her nose to his before tucking her head snugly under his chin.

x

Sesshoumaru turned his face back toward the sunset, and flew on.


End file.
